


Monsters Aren't Always The Ones We Think (and despite everything, it's never been you)

by OneTwoBreathe



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Arthur Trie To Understand Merlin And Everything That He Represents, Immortal Merlin, M/M, Magic Revealed, also immortality is scary, arthur dies at the end, magic reveal isn't the main plot, tbh i don't know what the main plot is
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-30
Updated: 2018-09-30
Packaged: 2019-07-20 19:25:47
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,129
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16143908
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OneTwoBreathe/pseuds/OneTwoBreathe
Summary: Arthur never truly understood magic, or power, of immortality, but maybe that's okay, because he understands Merlin.





	Monsters Aren't Always The Ones We Think (and despite everything, it's never been you)

Arthur was born a fighter. He was a warrior king, fire coursing through his veins and burning him up as he led brave and reckless men into wars they might not win. The world tasted of blood and smelled of smoke, the sound of swords always ringing in his ears and the battlefield engraved in his pupils. He’d been brought up with the stories of all the monsters he would have to slay, only a child when he'd been given the burden of a people to protect. He'd also been told of the monsters that hide in the hearts of men. He feared those the most, because they were more powerful than Kings and Kings aren’t supposed to be killed by monsters.

But Kings aren’t supposed to be saved by monsters either, and yet here he was, breathless and terrified and  _amazed_ as he watched the boy with the golden eyes and the golden heart scare the evil away, when he was supposed to be evil itself.

 

.

 

“You’re a Prince, and I’m just another boy without a crown,” had once said Merlin, when they were nothing but kids running in fields, filled up with happiness after slaying dragons. Just another boy, he'd said, so sure of his insignificance, yet now when Arthur looked at him he saw a God, and his name felt like a prayer on his lips, and how could he ever feel insignificant with so much power vibrating in his bones ? He asked himself again, drunk on awe and something more, he asked himself how anyone could see a monster in such beauty. He thought that maybe this was why he couldn't look at Merlin for too long. What others couldn't see, all the strength and courage and kindness and everything at once, flooded his eyes and his heart, and then he just had to look away.

 

.

 

Immortality was a foreign concept. A utopia he dreamt of when the prospect of running out of time grew too heavy, but also a nightmare that surged up when he realised everything he would have to lose along the way. Immortality was a foreign concept, but being here, contemplating someone who had to face it as a reality, forced him to realise just how intimidating it was. Everything that it implies, from how your bones will never grow weary, your face never show what it's been through, to how even your memory will end up failing you, because  _one_ lifetime is already too much to remember.

There was nothing in Merlin that could give it away, and Arthur could only wonder at the break of dawn : “ _How_ can you deal with this ?”. When you have kissed ghosts and thrown yourself of metaphorical cliffs, maybe it becomes less daunting.

 

.

 

Some questions were somewhat easier to ask.

“Why do you do it ?"

"Do what ?"

"You know what."

"You wouldn’t understand."

Arthur thought he did, but he wasn’t sure he wanted to.

 

.

 

"You'll forget me, one day."

They were laying side by side, looking up at the sky in the darkness, the cool air that came after a stifling hot day brushing gently across their faces. Doubt stretched in the space between their hands, a space where secrets spill and what-ifs bloom along whispered words.

"Don't say that."

"It's true, though. You'll forget me, they'll all forget me. I'm not like you, it's all too easy for me to fade in the background. But you... You're eternal."

"Merlin, you'll start having grey hair long after I'm dead. You're the eternal one."

"But not in the right way", Merlin whispered softly.

Arthur definitely didn't understand that.

 

.

 

They were at war, again. And if Arthur had once thought he was the Sun, one glance at Merlin’s blazing eyes was enough to permanently change his mind. Merlin was glowing, young and ancient and eternal in the middle of the battlefield, revelling in the attention as the world slowed down to gravitate around him. In this single moment, he was the centre of the universe, and for an eerie split second every knight stopped to look at him, entranced by the raw energy standing among them. Then a shout rang through the air - Merlin’s shout - and the sky set on fire.

 

.

 

Arthur knew he was dying. Merlin didn’t want to face it, but the pain in his side was unbearable and he wasn’t as blind as people seemed to think. Dried and fresh blood mixed on his skin and hair, a stark contrast on the golden strands. Pendragon red, he thought bitterly, as he remembered how much he used to love red and gold. “It’s a nice colour scheme”, had once said his father when picking out curtains for a guest room.

He’d die the way Kings of legends do, the way he wanted to, with a sword in his hand and no crown on his head. Maybe he should have been worried, but death doesn’t seem as intimidating when you’re loved by a God. Except there lies the tragedy with Gods and Kings : their stories never end well, because Fate spends too long working on them. Their destinies are bloodstained and soaked in pain because they're the ones that really matter.

Merlin's eyes felt like a curse on him, reminding him of what he was leaving behind, screaming at him "don't you dare, don't you dare stop breathing when you know I never will". He knew what he should say, "I'm sorry that I'll be forgetting you after all", "I'm sorry I didn't understand sooner", "I'm sorry that I won't be there to shout to the world how incredible you are", "I'm sorry that you'll have to remember me and feel nothing but pain", "I'm sorry because I know you'll wait for me even though I can't come back from that one". Maybe even a last, stolen "I love you", just _something_ to crystallise everything they'd been into reality. But Time has always been their enemy, and if "sorry" is a wasted word when you're dying, "I love you" is a curse. So, as his last breath was stolen away, he had to settle for something else, hoping it would carry all the meanings he gave to it. "Thank you", he said, praying to every God he'd heard of that Merlin would know, would understand that there was so much more Arthur wanted to say, and that he was saying thank you because he knew Merlin would always fight for the off chance that he could one day come back and say it all.

As he felt himself leaving, he saw the hope being replaced by raw pain in Merlin’s eyes, and if the piece of iron in his heart wasn’t already killing him, the tears choking up his throat would probably have drowned him.

**Author's Note:**

> I first wrote this, I think, a year and a half to two years ago. It was a gift for a friend, to motivate her to go to her boxing practice. I promised her I'd have something written by the time she'd get back. I kept working on it all this time, a word here and there, a new paragraph, a new idea, and I thought it was time I let it go. Ten years, right ? That calls for celebration.  
> This work is very infused with me, my own fears, my own thoughts, I somehow expect you to read my mind to know what I mean and it's so self indulgent it's ridiculous. But I really like it, and I hope you did too.


End file.
